HMCS Corner Brook. Image: Babcock
Canada is buying 12 submarines. The navy’s own analysis says it needs 22.
Rear Admiral Jason ArmstrongArmstrong made the admission Tuesday in his keynote at Vanguard Defence’s Deep Blue conference, the first major gathering of the submarine community since TKMS was named preferred supplier for the Canadian Patrol Submarine Project. The original Victoria-class requirement was six boats to cover one ocean, he noted.
“All their numbers say that it should be 22,” Armstrong said of navy studies.
WHY IT MATTERS
Twelve boats is already the largest submarine buy in Canadian history. A senior officer putting a bigger number on the record frames 12 as a floor, not a finish line.
The comment comes while contract negotiations with TKMS are still under way. Capt. Martin Burns, who leads the project team, gave a limited update for that reason.
Even 12 boats will stretch the navy’s people to the limit.
THE CREW GAP
Armstrong said the submarine force must grow from about 260 sailors today to roughly 1,200. The navy plans to build that force alongside the German and Norwegian navies. It is also working with British Columbia and Nova Scotia on college and university programs for the maintenance workforce.
“Not all the boats are going to arrive in the first day,” he said. “We have time to grow that force.”
The navy is working with DRDC on how uncrewed underwater systems will operate alongside the 212CD. Armstrong cast the submarine as the “apex predator” of a wider crewed and uncrewed network.
He named the protection of subsea cables and pipelines as a new area of warfare for his team.
On threats, he pointed to China’s fleet of more than 65 submarines and its investment in extra-large UUVs and UUV motherships. He said Russia has kept its submarine force sharp despite the war in Ukraine.
Armstrong called the deal a strategic partnership with Germany and Norway for the life of the boats, which he put at 30 to 40 years of service for Canada. Norway, an Arctic nation, will operate the same submarine.
Armstrong closed with a line he said he has used for years: “There will always be a submarine in our waters. We have to decide whose submarine that is.” By the navy’s own math, 12 boats may not be enough to settle that question.